by L. A. Boruff
"This is a shifter celebration, Leola, nobody else is welcome," Dylan responded for Cas.
"Is that true?" I looked at Cas, an expectant look on my face. If it was, he was going to be in serious trouble.
"It is technically true, but we don't really enforce it," he admitted.
"Then what's the problem?"
"Did you see how he came in?" Levon asked softly.
"Through the front door, I assume." I shrugged. How had anyone gotten into the bar’s patio? It was fairly obvious. At least, it was to me.
"That's not what he meant." Dylan grinned broadly. "But I saw you watching. I know what you are. Leprechaun magic doesn't work on unicorns."
"Why not?" That was a new one. Though I supposed there wasn't anything too odd about that. I didn't know much about the animal I shifted into. I hadn't even known what I properly looked like until the men had shown me the massive mirror in Cas's bedroom. Though, as soon as I'd shifted back from looking at myself, we'd put the mirror to a very different and more pleasurable use.
"One of the mystical things about the unicorn. One we'll never know the answer for."
Cas growled. "Tell her," he demanded.
"I did," Dylan responded. "At least, I told her all I knew."
"Did you see him doing anything with magic?" Levon prompted.
"Just the gold sparkles." But I didn't see how that was relevant.
"That was leprechaun magic," Kerry explained. "Leprechauns can confuse people and make them forget they've seen them. It's how they protect their stashes of gold."
I looked Dylan up and down, trying to work out what was going on and why he'd even bother doing that. "And you used it on the people here?" I asked him.
He glanced down at the floor. "Yes. And for that, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to betray anyone's trust."
"You did, big time," Cas growled. "The only person unaffected was Leola. Even the cubs were fooled."
"Would you have let me in if I'd asked?" he demanded.
Silence filled the whole area. Even the music had been shut off as the shifters either listened in on our conversation or snuck away through the gates.
"Exactly," Dylan answered for himself. "You'd have said no. I know you've heard the rumours about me, Casimir. That's why I'm here."
"I don't think this is the place to have this conversation," Cas said hurriedly.
"No. But then, I wasn't the one that called all the attention to us, was I?" Dylan's eyes sparkled, and I had to wonder how bothered he really was by that. He was clearly getting what he wanted out of this exchange.
"Alright, everyone," Cas shouted as he threw his arms up in the air. "It's time to go home. The party’s over."
Groans came from all around, but no one argued with him. They didn't dare. Cas was the boss, and everyone knew it.
"Come with us." Kerry grabbed Dylan's arm and dragged him towards the gate. "We're going to have a little chat."
I swallowed hard, unsure of what was going to happen. And as much as I was curious about it, I was also nervous. This man must be here for a reason, and I had a feeling that it wasn't a good one.
3
"Thank you." I took the mug of steaming tea from Levon and held it between my hands as I nervously studied the man sitting at our kitchen table. It hadn’t taken me long to feel comfortable in their home, even if I’d only just moved in. I suspected it was another shifter thing. My unicorn smelled my mates on everything, and that put her at ease, effectively claiming the space as our own.
All three of my mates were on edge, almost prowling through the room no matter what they were actually doing. And that had me on edge too.
"How far along are you?" Dylan asked.
"What? I'm...what?" I stuttered. How could he know? I was being careful with the clothing I wore and only my mates had seen me naked, and none of them had said anything about my changing shape. At least none of them seemed to have heard what the leprechaun said. Or maybe they were just pretending they hadn't so I could tell them in their own time.
"I'm sorry, I didn't realize it was a secret." He winked at me and leaned back in his chair.
All three of my mates sent me quizzical looks. I shook my head slightly, knowing that would be enough to avoid their questions. At least for now. I was sure they’d break eventually and need to know more.
"Why are you here, Dylan?" Cas demanded, bracing himself with both hands on the table and leaning forward. Even crouched over he cut an imposing figure. If he wasn't my mate, I wouldn't want to mess with him. Luckily, he was, and that gave me an advantage.
"Maybe if we ask nicely?" I reminded him and made a motion for him to sit down.
Thankfully, he listened to me, albeit with a glare on his face.
"What's all this about, Dylan?" I tried a more gentle approach. "Forgive me if I say anything wrong; I've never met a leprechaun before."
"I don't doubt it. Word on the street is that you didn't even know you were a shifter until recently, never mind a unicorn."
"That word on the street had better stop," Levon threatened.
"Levon," I warned him. What was it about this man that had my mates on edge? I'd never seen them act like this around anyone else. Granted, we hadn’t been together very long, but this was nuts.
"I'm looking for someone," he said softly. "I was hoping the pride could help me find her."
"Why would we do that?" Cas responded.
"It's in all of our best interests that we do," Dylan responded. "I don't know what she'll do if she goes unchecked for a significant length of time."
Levon growled.
"Why would that be?" Kerry responded, a lot calmer than the other two.
"You know why." The leprechaun gave them all pointed looks, and Levon nodded.
"Alright, what was that about?" I demanded, not liking that things were being kept from me. In my experience, that meant the things in question were about me. And I didn't like secrets like that. They weren't in anyone's best interest.
Dylan picked up his mug and took a deep drink before clearing his throat. "I'm an outcast. From leprechaun society mostly, but a lot of shifters and other supernaturals won't accept me either."
"Why? What did you do?"
"I fell in love."
Cas snorted. "That's not quite correct," he put in. "Dylan here fell in love with someone who'd already met their fated mate."
"Is that possible?" I'd never really considered it. I had three mates sitting at the same table as me and couldn't imagine ever loving someone like I loved them. It had been so immediate. So right. Everything I thought I’d felt in the past had faded away in comparison. Being with them was all consuming and impossible to ignore.
"It's possible," Levon told me. "But it's also rarer than the fated mates themselves."
"And frowned upon," Cas added. Ah, so there were more things about shifter society that I’d yet to learn.
"That doesn't change the facts," Dylan insisted. "I loved her, and I thought she loved me. But she'd never gotten over the death of her mate."
"Then how could she love you?" Levon asked.
Dylan chuckled and gestured around the table. "You tell me. Is love limited to just two people? Or can you love more than one person at once?"
"Point taken," Levon muttered.
"She seemed as though she was finally moving past what happened, but then someone visited her while we were in a pub in Dublin and said something. And no, before you ask, I don't know who it was or what they said, she didn't tell me, and I didn't pry. It wasn't my place to."
"But you want us to help you find her even though she abandoned you without a word?" I asked.
"It's not as simple as that. Before she came to Ireland, she did some bad things. She told me about them in vague terms, never any details. She claimed she didn't want to get me in any trouble if she was caught."
"Things like..."
"Murder," he whispered, his accent thickening, drawing out the word. "She told me she killed fated mates as a
punishment for the world taking the one she loved the most."
"Ah." Cas's one word told me more than he probably intended to. He clearly knew the events Dylan was referring to, which made me kind of scared about the kind of damage the woman in question could do.
"And you just let her get away with that? Without saying anything?" I asked.
"What would you do? If you discovered that one of your mates had done something terrible?" he asked me, looking straight into my eyes. "Would you love them any less? Would you abandon them?"
"No, of course not.” My eyes widened. “Are you saying they have?" Cas could be a tough alpha, of that I had no doubt, but I knew he wouldn't be able to truly hurt anyone.
He shrugged and my guys bristled. "Not that I'm aware of," Dylan answered. "But my point does still stand."
“Okay. Let’s lay this out. She’s your girlfriend? Wife?”
“Wife,” he said. “We married last summer.”
“She had a fated mate. Where’s he now?”
“Dead,” said Cas.
I looked at him in surprise. “How do you know?”
“Twenty-five years ago, or so, a man was killed here in the mountains. He left behind a wife, his fated mate,” he said. “He was shot when he stumbled across an illegal moonshine still a human had hidden deep in the mountains.”
I imagined how it would feel if I lost one of my mates. My stomach dropped. Just the thought nearly sent me into hysterics. “I can’t imagine how she must’ve felt.”
“She disappeared after the funeral. We never saw her again,” Levon said, eyes on Dylan.
“But not long after she disappeared, the murders began. The same murders that killed your parents,” Kerry said gently, one hand on my arm.
My jaw dropped.
"My parents?"
Dylan's eyes softened. "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't know."
"Then how'd you know my name?" I asked, trying to process the information he'd given me.
"Everyone knows your name, girl," he said in his thick accent. "You're famous."
"You think she came here?" Cas asked with a glare at Dylan.
"I do. She was doing really well, had a job at the pub for a good decade. We were as happy as we could be. Whatever the man said to her in the pub, it really threw her for a loop. She took off in the night. I can't think of anywhere else she would've gone." He closed his eyes and clenched his fists, resting on the table. "I wish I could fix her, or fix her life for her."
"If we find her, what do we do? Are we sure she really murdered people?" I asked. I'd been raised human, and had a strong sense of the justice system and how it should play out. I didn't know how the shifter laws worked, not really.
"She'll be tried, and her behavior of the last twenty-five years will be evaluated," Cas said.
"In a situation like this, where she clearly went insane for a period of time, she might not be punished too severely. The events will be studied, and the pride will come to a decision."
"And the relatives of the dead people?" I asked. Even if she'd gone crazy, she'd still deprived me of my parents, and it turned out they were rare unicorns to boot.
I might find my way to forgiving the person that murdered my parents one day, but I damn sure didn't feel like it right then.
"I don't know," Dylan said. "They deserve to see their loved ones' killer punished, but my girl, she's not the same. She doesn't have murder in her. I have a hard time believing she ever did."
"Well, there's nothing to do for it tonight. If she's here, she's here. She'll be here in the morning." Cas stood from the table, followed closely by Kerry and Levon. "Where are you staying, Leprechaun?" Cas's use of Dylan's species was a power move, and I didn't like it. Sometimes alpha males were assholes.
"I haven't arranged anything yet," Dylan said, also standing. "Do you have any suggestions?"
I opened my mouth to suggest he sleep on our couch when Levon stepped forward. "There's a deer couple that runs a bed and breakfast not far from here. I'd be happy to drive you."
Dylan agreed, and we said goodbye. Levon winked at me as he shut the door. "Be back soon."
A confused mess, I turned to the kitchen. It was late, the party had run into the night. But even late, I needed to work out my energy while I waited on Levon to return home.
So, I scrubbed. I heard Cas and Kerry talking quietly in the living room, but I ignored them and got out a bottle of bleach and a sponge.
When Levon returned home a half hour later, I wasn't finished.
"You okay, Lo?" he asked, using a pet name he'd started calling me.
"I don't know," I said tersely. "I'm mad."
"At us?"
"Maybe a little," I said. "You knew about my parents? You knew that much backstory and didn't bother letting me know?"
"We weren't sure, then things kept coming up," he said as he walked further into the room. I sensed Cas and Kerry joining us.
"You should've made time," I said.
"Yes, we should’ve," Cas replied. "We actually talked about it a time or two. How to bring it up. But, we never found the right way, and then more time slipped away."
We'd only known each other a few weeks. I'd moved in immediately, and we'd gone from four single adults to a tight-knit mated couple-of-sorts.
It would take a lot of adjusting. Fated mates always did. When you met your fated mate, nothing else mattered. You just had to be with them.
I had it on good authority there was always a bunch of sex, too, especially at first, but also throughout the entirety of mates' lives.
I scrubbed the countertop, not that it needed it. "I forgive you," I said. "You're not the only ones that have been keeping secrets."
"Yeah, what the hell was he talking about?" Levon asked. I was a bit surprised the question came from him and not Cas. I froze in my scrubbing and turned to face them.
"I'm either pregnant, or gaining weight exceptionally fast. It's happened so quickly, I'm not sure it's normal. It scared me a little, and I didn't say anything."
The grins on their faces lit up the room. They exploded in happiness, talking over each other, congratulating me, asking me if I knew which of them the father was.
I was quickly swept up into their arms, squished between them in a big group hug.
"No, I don't know which of you is the father, and yes I feel fine. Just confused about the speed."
"That's normal. Our women tend to be pregnant the same amount of time as our animal counterparts," Kerry said.
I gave him a blank look. The only animal gestation period I could think of was an elephant. Those poor creatures were pregnant for nearly two years. "Oh, my god," I whispered as I wriggled out of their arms. "I need my phone."
Twirling in place to look all over the kitchen, I tried to remember where I'd set it down when we'd come in with Dylan.
"What's wrong?" Cas asked as they watched me run from the room to check the living room. They quickly followed.
It was on the stand by the door with our keys. "Oh, thank goodness." I snatched it up and ran a quick internet search for how long a deer stayed pregnant. "It ranges, but it looks like about thirty weeks," I said.
"What's thirty weeks?" Cas asked.
I looked up at them, relieved. "A deer's pregnancy." It would explain why I was already showing. The baby was growing faster than if I were human.
"But you're not a deer," Kerry said. "You're a unicorn."
"I know, but I thought I was a deer for a long time, and my shifted body closely resembles one. Unless you already know how long a unicorn is pregnant?" I asked him. It had been a shock to learn what I really was. I’d never stayed shifted for long before meeting the three of them. It had always freaked me out a bit. Which meant I’d never actually seen more of myself than a couple of fleeting glimpses in the mirror and a look at my legs. Hence believing I was a deer for so long. Though if anyone asked me, I still felt like I looked more like a deer than a unicorn. Other than the horn, anyway.
"
No," Kerry admitted. "But, I might be able to find a record of your birth."
My jaw dropped. "I hadn't thought of that. Do you think they exist?"
"Maybe. My mom helped with births a lot back then if there were no complications. Dad was the shaman, but mom was the one who was really good about record keeping."
"I'd love to see them. And to know how long I'll be pregnant," I whispered, smiling at him. Based on the size of my stomach, I didn't think it would be long. "Did you guys really not notice I was putting on weight?" I asked.
"Not really.” Kerry shrugged, clearly not caring about my weight in the slightest. "You're beautiful."
I stared at him and judged his words. He truly believed them. He thought I was beautiful.
Not that I thought I was ugly, or anything, but I'd never thought of myself as beautiful. Just sort of average. "Thank you," I said.
He strode forward and put his arms around me as I looked up at him. His face descended toward mine, and my gaze was glued to his lips until they met mine and I could no longer see them. I moaned in his arms as his tongue pushed my lips apart, claiming my own.
These men had the ability to turn me to jelly with one kiss. No wonder I was already pregnant.
He leaned over and swept my legs out from under me, carrying me out of the living room and into the bedroom. I heard Cas's voice as we left the room. "Let's give them a minute," he said. Levon chuckled. "I think the lady needs her shaman."
I did need him.
He took me to his bedroom, which was decorated exactly how a shaman's should be in rich browns and greens. He laid me gently down on the bedspread. "I've always wanted to be a father," he whispered.
"I've never even thought about being a mother," I replied. "My childhood was so unconventional that I just figured I wouldn't."
"How do you feel now?" he asked as he smoothed his hands over my stomach. "I can tell now that you've pointed it out."
"I feel fine. And I'm looking forward to it, more than I ever would've thought possible." I lifted my shirt to expose my stomach. "Just a little pooch there," I said.
"I haven't had much training on births and pregnancies," he said. "Just a little. Nowadays most women use the local shifter doula, and I only step in to help in emergencies."